Breene Murphy, ClipperBlog: Bubble picks are usually the hardest and this one's no different. I'd probably go with Ed Davis. Toronto doesn't get as much pub as many of the other teams, but I was pleasantly surprised by Davis in the second half.

Eddy Rivera, Magic Basketball: Ed Davis. Hampered by a knee injury to start his rookie campaign, Davis slowly turned on the jets from December 'til the end of the season -- notably tallying six double-doubles in his final 11 games. He is well on his way with his rebounding and defending. But the key to unlocking Davis' potential is his offensive repertoire. That'll determine if the Raptors have a viable Chris Bosh replacement or just a good player.

Could be. Especially if he adds a bit of weight and can improve his scoring a little. As a starter last season he average nearly a double double. Therefor it's not crazy to think so. The only obstacle for him will be playing time, which imo will go down considerably unless he comes into training camp and forces them to play him 25+mpg with his play. But getting consistent minutes for him will be difficult with Bargnani starting at the 4 (unless they put that idea off one more season, when Val comes over) and Amir making almost 6Mil next season.

Sounds like a stretch to put Davis into top 5.
Not to mention Patterson and Paul George, both way better defenders than Ed.
And Landry Fields.
And Gordon Hayward, who seemed ready for a major soph year.

it's not about last year -- otherwise it would be Landry in top 5.
i think George, Patterson and to a lesser degree Favors are considerably better defenders than Ed Davis right now. I think Favors has a ton more potential going forward, and he was already good when given an opportunity last year.

Davis may still have more minutes because the team sucks. But I wouldn't take him over Favors.

it's not about last year -- otherwise it would be Landry in top 5.
i think George, Patterson and to a lesser degree Favors are considerably better defenders than Ed Davis right now. I think Favors has a ton more potential going forward, and he was already good when given an opportunity last year.

Davis may still have more minutes because the team sucks. But I wouldn't take him over Favors.

not so sure you can say george and patterson are better defenders, but I agree Davis isn't a lock for top 5.... as for Fields, he's overrated if anyone thinks he's close to top 5 going forward.

i don't think Fields is top 5 going forward either, maybe not even top 10 (Evan Turner or the Johnson guy from Wolves may push him out).

as for George, he played the 2nd best D on Derrick Rose that I saw in these playoffs, after LeBron.
And he's a rookie. He had a rough rookie year because Indiana was a mess, but he's good. At the very least, he'll be a very very good defender.
Amazing defensive quickness for a big wing.
(PS I think he'd be a perfect fit next to DeRozan at 3)

Patterson I think is the best player of that group right now btw.
Very mature player. Very mature defender especially. He's similar to Taj Gibson, even more physically gifted, and he can also make a jumper.
If he didn't play behind Scola, he'd get way more attention.
But I just don't think he'll improve much. He's older and he's stuck on a team with at least 4 PFs.
So looking forward, I'd probably take Davis.

It was kind've outta sorts that Portland's Wesley Matthews was selected to play on last season's sophmore team. The other players in that game were thinking he was way too old. "Look, he's got a beard!"

As much as i like davis and believe he has a chance to be excellent, i do see the logic of trading him for a great SF. Bayless comes into the consideration too because it's pretty obvious our next pick will be either a PG or SF.

Next season i hope davis and Bargs are both given plenty of mins, maybe even sometimes on at the same time to try and enable that. That way we can see which of them is best for us going forward. They both have trade value and imo we're not good enough to have 2 valuable players in the same position.

at this point i would put patterson just a touch ahead of davis, but davis has more potential to improve from last season to next imo.

So all in all i would argue we shouldn't be looking at trades straight away. Need to assess bayless, Bargs and Ed.